Series ranks among most lopsided

Red Sox compile impressive stats in championship run

By Tom Singer / MLB.com

Already struggling against a perception of inferiority, the National League and its West Division both might have a lot of explaining to do following this World Series.

A Colorado team that had absolutely blitzed through the league for the final two weeks of the regular season, and then the first two tiers of the 2007 postseason, became prey in one of the most lopsided Fall Classics ever.

Part of it was too much rest following the Championship Series. Most of it was too much Boston. Bottom-line, it was an uncomfortably merciless beating.

In flipping the Denver calendar to Rockedtober, the Red Sox turned in their second dominant postseason in four years.

So one amazing run -- the Rockies' 21-1 pre-Series ride - made way for another, the Red Sox closing shop with seven straight wins. This, from a team whose longest regular-season winning streak was five.

So follow the dots . . .

 The Red Sox now own the two longest winning streaks in any one postseason.

In 2004, they ripped off the record eight straight -- starting from the 0-3 hole in the AL Championship Series against the Yankees. The following year, the White Sox tied that mark by taking the last four games of the ALCS over the Angels, following that with a World Series sweep of Houston.

The Red Sox finished off this October by winning their last seven in a row -- punctuating it by flattening another of the six other teams to compile a seven-win streak in a playoff.

In addition to the Rockies, who of course had swept both the Division Series and the Championship Series, the teams with seven-game postseason winning streaks were the 2006 Tigers, 1998 Yankees, 1995 Braves and 1976 Reds.

 Boston outscored the Rockies by 19 runs, the second-largest differential in 47 years.

In 2001, the D-backs outscored the Yankees by 23 in taking a seven-game Series. Prior to that, the Bombers had set the all-time record with a 28-run edge in 1960 over the Pirates -- in losing that seven-game Classic.

 Boston's 29-10 edge in runs was the fourth most disproportionate ever: